A Soul's Journey
by tmbocheeko
Summary: Voldemort's attack on the Potter household that fateful night went a little different than it was supposed to. A little careful planning can go a long way, and that seems to have made great strides for the Dark Lord, despite Harry still living. If a Killing Curse can't handle the boy, there's sure to be something that can. HP AU from the very beginning, RWBY canon until crossover.
1. Chapter 1: Halloween, 1981

**A/N: Hello dear reader! I'd just like to take a second to explain some things. This is my first story, therefore there's bound to be many types of mess ups, flops, or things that you might know better than I do. I welcome any criticism, please feel free to call me out on things. If it's important enough, I'll come back and edit the story or address it in an Author's Note.**

 **RWBY is canon until crossover, HP universe is AU from start but decently close to canon. Not gonna spoil when the crossover will happen, but there's a bit of world building that I'd like to get in before shipping our heroes across dimensions.**

 **Hope you enjoy my first story, A Soul's Journey.**

 **Oh, and I own nothing RWBY or Harry Potter, that beautiful right belongs to Rooster Teeth and J.K. Rowling, respectively.**

* * *

Overall, October 31st, 1981 was a rather productive day for the Leader of the Light.

Voldemort was destroyed by Lily's love for Harry, as planned. Both parents, unfortunately, had to die to accomplish this, but what are two deaths compared to the countless lives saved with Tom no longer alive? They died as they served the Order of the Pheonix, all in the name of the greater good. Pettigrew, the apparent mole, or rat as it were, in the Order, was killed at the scene. If his body lying still in the doorway was any indication, James seeing his former friend with the Dark Lord filled him with enough hate to cast the _Avada Kedavra_ instantly. Augustus Rookwood and Rodolphus LeStrange's bodies were also found dead in the house, seemingly by the Potter patriarch's wand. In the nursery, James and Lily's bodies both lay, along with the shattered remains of Harry's crib. Voldemort, seemingly completely destroyed, left no traces other than his wand.

Something did strike the old wizard as odd, though. Voldemort brought help with him. Whenever Aurors discovered a Death Eater raid, Tom was always either seen alone or not at all. Severus' spying revealed that this was a simple matter of Tom not trusting any of his followers enough to allow them to travel with him.

Due to the unforeseen occurring, Albus ordered Hagrid to bring Harry to Madam Pomfrey before even himself. It was very fortunate that he made that decision because what was found inside of Harry was truly terrifying on so many fronts.

His newly acquired lightning bolt-shaped scar was host to a piece of the Dark Lord's soul.

Of course, Albus was no fool and had taken notice of Riddle's obsession with souls and death early in his time at Hogwarts. Before he left after his NEWTs, he made sure to have Madame Pomfrey scan his soul, as a part of 'a farewell checkup', and kept that hidden in his desk. At the time, his weakened soul didn't make any sense to the Headmaster. But comparing the fragment within the boy to Tom's from seventh year, the truth finally dawned upon him. Tom had split his soul 5 times prior to his destruction at the hands of the Boy-Who-Lived, easily deducable when comparing it to his seventh-year soul.

' _Five Horcruxes? No, no that can't be. Tom was much too obsessive to stop at 6 divisions when 7 was known as the greatest number in magic. But then what could possibly…_ '

And then he realized his mistake so many years ago.

' _Tom Riddle, the most soul-obsessed man ever to walk the Earth, to have such a weak soul in his prime? How foolish of me to think that possible! He split his soul, created his first Horcrux, with the murder of Myrtle Warren._ ' The wise Supreme Mugwump knew, of course, that Hagrid had not been responsible for the bathroom dweller's death. Even back before knowing about the Horcruxes, this much was obvious. He knew it was Tom, but thought little of it, especially without any evidence against the young Dark Lord. It created such a loyal follower to the Leader of the Light, that he had previously deemed the event a net positive for the greater good. Without Hagrid, how else would he have retrieved Harry from the ruined building before even Sirius could show up?

Albus decided then and there to go looking for Tom's Horcruxes and destroy them all. With one little lightning bolt-shaped exception.

' _Harry must remain a container for Riddle's soul. It is the perfect way to complete the prophecy; as long as Harry lives so does Voldemort, and once Harry sacrifices himself, he will bring the Dark Lord with him._ '

Now he just needed a way to ensure the boy would be willing to sacrifice himself…

* * *

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN I CAN'T SEE HIM!? HE'S MY GODSON FOR MERLIN'S SAKES!" Sirius' screams of anger echoed throughout the Hospital Wing, all except the single bed with curtains closed.

"Mister Black, please understand, I am under direct orders from the Headmaster to-"

"I DON'T GIVE A RAT'S ARSE IF GODRIC GRYFFINDOR HIMSELF TOLD YOU, I DEMAND TO SEE HIM!" Madame Pomfrey's attempt to dissuade the Marauder ended with nothing but screaming.

"Mister Lupin, would you please talk some sense into Mister Black?" Madame Pomfrey nearly begged of the werewolf, finally addressing him after the countless minutes of being yelled at by her former student.

"I don't believe he's the one who needs sense talked into, Poppy," Remus said with a deadpan.

"And whatever would that mean, Mister Lupin?"

"What do you think the people will do when they find out that the Headmaster and his pet Healer were keeping the savior of Wizarding Britain, the Boy-Who-Lived, locked up and away from his rightful guardian? Do you think they will just accept that Albus is doing this for the 'greater good'?" Remus smirked at Sirius. "Especially not when that rightful guardian makes so much of a ruckus about it?"

Finally breaking the scowl he had been holding since arriving at Hogwarts, he grinned back at Remus. As much of a grin as one could muster while still attempting to put some fear into their old nurse, that is. "Thank you, Moony, now I believe that should be enough to claim my godson, don't you? Unless you would prefer to be remembered as the Healer-Who-Locked-Up?"

Both others in the room just gave the dog Animagus an irritated look.

"Hey, I wasn't ever good with nicknames. If it were up to me, we'd be Fluffy, Bitey, Bambi and _Tiny_." He stressed the potential nickname for their traitorous friend with as much venom as he could muster. "You gotta admit, Healer-Who-Locked-Up is at least an improvement to _those_."

Madame Pomfrey simply pinched the bridge of her nose as a response, before opening up the curtains to Harry's bed.

"Thank you, Poppy, I knew you'd understand eventually," Sirius said with a smirk.

"Really? You knew she'd understand? Is that why you spent most of our time here yelling? If it weren't for _me_ , I'm sure we would still be here, with you having a screaming fit," Remus replied.

The child in an adult's body replied, "Nuh-uh!"

Remus, giving in to his inner child, angrily shot back, "Yuh-huh!

An angry Medi-Witch finally broke and screamed,"BOYS! Take your ward and leave me before I make you needing beds here yourselves!"

"Yes, Madame Pomfrey," the two replied sullenly.

The remaining Marauders took the newly crowned Boy-Who-Lived, and left the Hospital Wing without another word, not wanting to see if her words were a threat or a promise.

After they were long gone, she scoffed and thought to herself, ' _Medi-Witch-Who-Meddled would be a much better nickname than Healer-Who-Locked-Up._ '

* * *

 **Here it is, Chapter One of my first fic! It feels good to get this out, I've had the idea stirring around in my head for quite a few days now, just trying to get things settled a bit before writing it down.**

 **I'm a little over-excited about the story and will be probably posting Chapter Two by the end of today. I hope you all enjoyed this, and there'll start to be some real action soon enough.**


	2. Chapter 2: Growing Up

**A/N: Didn't get this chapter up within the same day as I thought, but that was just because I got on my bike and didn't get back off for about 4 hours. I've been mulling over possible ways the first 5 chapters can go in my head for so long now, that the little taste of freedom that came with writing Chapter One got the creative juices flowing and they just won't stop. The bike ride actually helped a bit with that.**

 **Time skips will be denoted with** oOo **, but scene changes are the usual horizontal bar. This is how I shall be formatting any further time skips. Also keep in mind that unless I end on a cliffhanger, it's safe to assume there's some kind of time skip between chapters.**

 **As per usual, and just like everyone else (with the exception of J.K. Rowling and those lucky SOBs over at Rooster Teeth), I own not a single thing.**

* * *

Sirius knew that taking care of baby Harry alone would be difficult, so he decided to rope Remus into it too. However, the two Marauders were ill-equipped to deal with a baby, even with magic helping them. For some reason, they thought that bringing another kid into the mix as a distraction would help the situation.

They were wrong. Very, very wrong.

Harry Potter and Neville Longbottom turned out to be two peas in a pod. Loved to fly around on their tiny toy brooms, loved to stuff their faces with as much treacle tart as their three-year-old hands could grab, and most importantly, loved to mess with the Marauder pair.

Their 'accidental magic', if you could even call it that, helped them out tremendously. Lifting bowls of food above Sirius' head just to let it fall and splatter all over his hair, exchanging Remus' tea for coffee, and simply doing what babies do best, that being a constant demand for attention. Granted, they didn't need magic for the last one.

To top it all off, the Marauder duo got seemingly stuck with the two of them. Frank and Alice Longbottom were attacked by a squad of Death Eaters at the same time as Voldemort's attack on the Potters, and despite holding their ground for a long time, all they could manage to do was stall for the Aurors to come. Luckily, they managed to get there right as Bellatrix LeStrange broke down the wards on baby Neville's door. They arrested her along with Crabbe, Goyle, and Malfoy Srs. Lucius' political power and weak 'I was under the Imperius Curse' defense got him out of Azkaban for life, but couldn't spare the others.

The fact that one of her son's killers was free nearly drove the elderly Augusta Longbottom mad. Unfortunately, Sirius had no idea of this when he offered to take Neville off of her hands one week in November. That week quickly became a month, that month a year, and now they had both trouble making babies on their hands seemingly permanently.

As another bowl of porridge fell onto Sirius' hair, he just wished for some kind of break.

oOo

Years later, and Sirius and Remus still had only barely gotten a semblance of a break. Madame Longbottom finally got her act together and decided she could raise Neville herself, much to the Marauders' relief and Harry's dismay. Luckily for Harry, those two had grown too close to be separated, and they had to watch over the two of them together constantly. One day, mid-August, they finally cracked the older Longbottom and got her watch the kids.

Or so they thought.

Turns out, they managed to find James' old Invisibility Cloak, and followed the Marauders to Remus' car and went to the muggle supermarket with them.

"All I'm saying is after six years of non-stop kids we need some kind of way to relax."

Remus scoffed at him, saying, "Oh please like _you_ need the break, I'm the one doing everything for them while you just let them ride around on Padfoot."

Sirius, mock offended, tried to defend himself. "Well being the attack dog, guard dog, horse, and pillow for two seven-year-olds isn't easy. Those bloody kids never run out of energy! Pa'foo this, Pads that!" He then started whimpering. "One of the wankers even bit my tail."

That was when the two couldn't restrain themselves any longer, and burst out laughing.

"Oh no they didn't," both Marauders said in tandem.

Remus reached behind and pulled the cloak off. And immediately burst out laughing, which set Sirius off laughing, which set the youngsters off laughing again.

Finally, when they were all done laughing, they figured out that they had been in the supermarket parking lot for about 5 minutes already. And it dawned on the adults that they actually had to bring the kids inside of a muggle store.

A couple minute's worth of Remus saying 'do this', the boys responding with a 'yes Uncle Moony', Sirius saying 'do that' quickly followed up by a ' _never_ do that' from Remus, and another 'yes Uncle Moony' and a snicker, they finally deemed the duo good enough to come with on the magical journey to the supermarket.

Things actually started off rather well, Sirius got a couple huge racks of ribs, Remus grabbed the beer, and the dastardly duo decided to actually behave after a quick conversation between them.

" _Psst, Nev, if we wanna get out of the flat again we might actually have to,"_ Harry gulped loudly, " _behave!"_ , _t_ o which Neville only responded with a sullen nod.

"Wow this has got to be the most relaxing day we've had in years!" Sirius said, deciding to jinx it.

"Sirius Black? Who let YOU out of the Kennel?"

Sirius recognized that voice, that disgustingly pompous and arrogant voice.

"Petunia Dursley, what a… _pleasant_ surprise. What ever can I do for _suuuch_ a fine lady like yourself this _wonderful_ day?" Sirius asked, with only a teensy bit of loathing coming from his voice.

"You can-" Petunia started to sound like she was about to go on a rant of some kind, but was interrupted by Harry.

"Uncle Pa'foo, who's this?"

Sirius sighed. "Well, Harry, guess you'd have to find out about this part of your family at some point. This right here is Petunia Dursley. Petunia Dursley née Evans."

Harry started to scratch his head. "Evans? Evans… Oh, Evans! That was mum's name, right? So are you mum's mum?"

"You insolent little freak, I was her _sister_ , not her _mother_!" Petunia screeched back at the boy, earning a few stares from other customers.

"Well you look old enough to be mum's mum," Harry responded.

Remus, recognizing that voice, comes over from the aisle over to the rescue. Not Sirius' rescue, though.

"Harry, Neville, how would you two like to pick out some ice cream?" Remus said, shooting an evil and knowing smirk at his fellow Marauder.

"ICE CREAM!" The youngsters yelled, and burst off headed to the back of the store.

As Harry and Neville rush around the corner to head to the frozen foods section, they run right into a bushy-haired girl with a notable THUMP. It knocks her over, and the couple things she seemed to have been carrying. Neville looks at her, looks at the frozen foods section, back at the bushy mess of hair, back at the delicious ice cream aisle, and decides to start off again. Harry, on the other hand, offers her a hand.

"Heyo, my name's Harry. Harry Potter. I'm sorry for running into you like that, and I'm sure Nev is too, just on his way to go get some ice cream so he's excited," he says as he starts helping her pick up few scattered items.

The girl gives him a light smile. "Oh it's quite fine, I'm used to it from school. I'm Hermione by the way."

' _Used to it from school?_ ' Harry's about to ask her what that's supposed to mean when he hears her name being called from about two aisles away.

"Ooh I have to go, that's my dad. It was nice meeting you, Harry," she says and starts to walk off.

Harry gives her a big grin. "Nice meeting you too, Her-my-my-o-knee?" He says her name, trying to sound it out.

She giggles at him, and says, "Hermione."

' _Hermione. Hmm, hope I meet her again, she seemed nice._ '

"I had no idea one of our little pranksters was actually such a gentleman," Remus says, making his presence noted again.

Harry just responds with a glare and some puffed cheeks, and runs off to join Neville in picking out ice cream. Remus smiles fondly and follows him. After a few peaceful minutes of Harry and Neville debating ice cream flavors, and why their favorite is clearly superior, they hear a scream from across the supermarket.

"WELL, I DON'T KNOW WHAT WENT THROUGH MY BLOODY MIND WHEN I DID, BUT TRUST ME THAT SUMMER WAS THE WORST SUMMER I HAD EVER EXPERIENCED! AND DON'T FORGET I GOT DISOWNED THE SUMMER BEFORE THAT!"

"Oh no," Remus mumbles, putting his palm over his face. "Come on you two, it seems we gotta go rescue Uncle Pads."

"Ooooh?" The two say and snicker at the thought of two seven-year-olds rescuing a grown man from the lady who is apparently Harry's aunt.

As they get there Petunia notices Remus and gets an indistinguishable look on her face. "Oh, have to rely on your little boyfriend to rescue you, freak?" That look turned into a condescending one, aimed more at Remus than Sirius.

"Petunia, grow up. You're screaming and starting fights in a supermarket. Sirius over here is a ten-year-old trapped in an adult's body, so he has an excuse." Sirius shoots Remus a betrayed look at this. Remus smirks at his closest living friend, "And besides, you know if I _did_ swing that way, I could do much better than this prat." Sirius feigns extreme shock, doubling over in fake pain.

"Well, HE-" Petunia started, but was interrupted by Neville of all people.

"Missus Harry's apparently aunt, can you please just let our Uncle go? I wanna eat my ice cream." This managed to shut Petunia up real quick, somehow the interruption from the boy alerting her to all the stares they had been accumulating from the fight. She just blocks her face, running out of the supermarket mumbling about ' _those damned freaks_ '.

The honorary uncles turn to Neville, proud and pleased him.

"Hey Nev, I think ending this should make you deserve another tub of ice cream." Harry tries to give puppy-dog eyes at Sirius, who just replies with a barking laugh.

"Sure, kids. Sure."

* * *

 **Yes, I'm having it so Sirius and Petunia dated for a short while. I'd like to think she has some credible reason for hating magicals as much as she did in canon, so why not have it be that Sirius broke her heart? I've always seen him as kinda a man-slut, so it felt right. As right as anything involving Petunia can be, that is.**

 **I'm extremely happy with the support this story has been getting so far, thank all of you for reading! I'm shooting for a new chapter on Monday, might be sooner though if I get some real nice inspiration. Next chapter will be the boys heading to Hogwarts, crossover in about 5 chapters (don't hold me to that, though).**


	3. Chapter 3: Dumbledore: Horcrux Hunter

**A/N: I didn't expect this chapter to be up so early, but work was dead after 11 am today, so I had a lot of time to think and pretty much planned out the next two chapters in advance. (To anyone interested, I'm a busboy (borderline waiter) at a bakery/restaurant.)**

 **Alright so here's a little bit of an info dump since I can't figure out a way to write this into the story without stalling the crossover even further, even with all that extra planning.**

 **Harry gets his normal wand, pretty much everything in Ollivander's is normal for him. Neville gets his own wand to start with, not his father's. They both get wand holsters. Uncle Algie still gives Neville Trevor, and Harry still gets Hedwig (just not as a gift from Hagrid). Both boys know a little about some of the purebloods, especially the bigger names like Malfoy. They also have been taught a little of the non-wand based magics, like very basic ancient runes, herbology, and potions.**

 **Sirius and Remus have pretty much been surviving on the Black fortune, if I get enough interest in that I'll explain how Walburga is dead so early (which is why Sirius controls the Black vaults). Harry has access to his Potter trust vaults but doesn't see a reason to have money on him until they can all go to Hogsmeade.**

 **Dumbledore has been very distracted by the Horcruxes the past few years and has been much less involved in everything school related. That doesn't change too much, but it should be very noticeable.**

 **I own just as much of Harry Potter and RWBY as I do the bakery I work at, a big fat 0%.**

* * *

The Gaunt Shack. An abandoned place, a decaying place, a worthless place. All that, and the most interesting place in the world for one seemingly senile old man. He lifts a loose floorboard, finally finding what he has been looking for. With a powerful flick of his wand and a tap of a portkey in his pocket, he vanishes and leaves behind an extremely intense fire. The fire spreads throughout the house, and to a little bit of the nearby graveyard. This horrible fire, this _Fiendfyre_ , could have, and by all means, _should_ have destroyed much more than it did, but that didn't seem to matter to the old man.

He lands at his destination with an audible _pop_ and sits down to look at the rewards of his hard work. The third Horcrux he has found. Just before he can, however, he notices the woman seemingly frothing in anger at him standing in his office.

"Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore! What in Merlin's name have you been doing!?"

He just gives her a calming look, and with a twinkle in his eyes he says, "Ah yes, Minerva, you see I was-"

"You know what? I don't particularly care right now. What I _do_ care about is the reason why _this_ showed up, along with all of the other Hogwarts admission letters!" Minerva slams a sheet of parchment into the desk.

Albus gives the parchment a quick glance, and says, " I don't see the problem, Minerva. This is simply Harry Potter's acceptance letter for Hogwarts."

"We have been searching for the boy since he disappeared from the Hogwarts infirmary that Halloween night! If he was somewhere where he could easily reply to an owl, why is it that we had not found him prior to this!? Most astoundingly, he was in the most obvious place possible!"

She points to the bottom of the page, where the parent or guardian's signature lay. In simple script, it clearly stated: _Sirius Black._

"Sirius Black? No, no that's not possible, I had him shipped off to Azkaban years ago, did I not? Right after I…" He noticed his Deputy Headmistress' snarl turn to one of extreme shock, and immediately realized his mistake.

"Oh dear."

oOo _Flashback_ oOo

 _November 1st, 1981_

" _Poppy? How is the boy?" Albus called as he entered the Hospital Wing._

" _Albus, his godfather and Mr. Lupin arrived yesterday to pick him up. I released him to them after a rather heated debate. I attempted to tell you, but your gargoyle informed me that you were taking no guests and that I needn't come back 'until he comes down'," Madame Pomfrey said, crossing her arms on her chest._

" _Oh dear, no, no that must not be allowed to happen. I'm afraid, Poppy, that you are simply going to have to forget this happened, and I will go retrieve the boy. He must be raised by his Aunt and Uncle." As he finishes this, he reaches into his robes and pulls out his wand._

" _Albus, what ever could you-"_

" _Obliviate."_

' _I'll just call Severus and have him enact a Death Eater raid on the Black Household or something, and frame Black and Lupin, but for now, I'll get back to my Horcrux research.'_

 _Severus Snape never got any order to do such thing._

oOo _End Flashback_ oOo

"Did you try to get one of my students arrested!?" Minerva shouted, which broke Albus from his thoughts.

"Oh, no, not at all dear Minerva, simply just ramblings of an old man. How about you go check up on Harry? Tell me how he's doing, how he's been raised, and how much he values the greater good." Minerva just gives him an inquisitive look, passes him a letter that she received, addressed to him for some reason, and walks out. Somehow, she ended up more confused than she started with, and even for the Headmaster these past ten years, that was saying something.

 _Dear Dumbledore,_

 _I am rather surprised that you never tried to locate the flat that we have been raising Harry in. It wasn't under a Fidelus or anything, so we were expecting you within a week. Imagine how we reacted when you, or a Professor, or one of the Ministry employees, or anyone really, doesn't show up at all in ten years!_

 _I do have to say, however, that this worked out rather well for us. We got to raise Harry and Neville ourselves, without any interference of the bloody Boy-Who-Lived crap. He actually only just found out about him being the Boy-Who-Lived and only out of necessity to prepare him for Diagon Alley. At this point, I think it's rather obvious that you shan't try to find us again until the first day of Hogwarts since you've been this uninvolved in everything._

 _-S.O.B._

 _To Minnie, I solemnly swear I am up to no good._

 _I know Remus is gonna be sending this letter your way before it hits Dumbledore, and that you're gonna read it before you simply pass it on to him, so I just wanted you to do me a teensy favor. Would you mind getting the thing I know you knew we had before you know who took it and locked it away you know where? You should know where to leave it for him to find it, I assume. I know you won't be too happy about giving him that, but I hope you'll do just this little something for your favorite_ _students? Thanks, love._

 _Oh yeah, and Harry's totally fine and not in any way a Marauder or prankster, trust us. Marauder's Honor._

 _Mischief Managed,_

 _Sirius_

 _Dear Deputy Headmistress McGonagall,_

 _I'm terribly sorry for how Mr. Black has worded his parts of the letter, with all the triviality. Honestly, why not just send two separate letters? Anyway, Harry_ is _actually safe and doing alright, mainly because I've teaching the boys to not listen to Sirius. We'll tell him to make sure he speaks to you, and that you're trustworthy. If you wish to discuss anything further, we should both be free the first Hogsmeade weekend, and we can speak in the Hog's Head._

 _Sincerely, Remus Lupin._

The old Headmaster thought about this for a little bit. ' _The thing? Him? You-Know-Who? You know where? What could any of that mean? Plus Mischief Managed and I solemnly swear I am up to no good sound vaguely familiar… Maybe something the young Marauders said in their prime? It shouldn't matter much, the boy will be in Hogwarts within a month(I think, what day is today?) anyway, so I can mold him into the sacrifice he needs to be.'_

* * *

Harry, Neville, and the 'Uncles' arrived at Platform 9 ¾ about twenty minutes before the train was scheduled to depart.

"Okay boys, let's just do a quick check to make sure you have everything you need."

"Yes, Uncle Moony."

"Obviously you have Hedwig in her cage right there, but where's Trevor, Neville?"

Trevor must have heard this and decided to poke his head out of Neville's pocket. " _Ribbit._ "

"Moleskin Pouch?"

"Yes, Uncle Moony." The two indicate the clearly visible pouch on their sides.

"Wands?"

"Yes, Uncle Moony." They roll their sleeves back, showing the wand in the holster.

"We already did a check of your trunks, so as long as you have them you should be good with everything else. Do you have those?"

"Yes, Uncle Moony." They roll their eyes before shaking the trunks in front of his face.

Sirius finally decides to speak up. "Now you remember everything about the trunks, right?"

Neville looked a little lost in thought, while Harry grinned and started naming off everything. "The first lock on the trunk is typical storage stuff, robes, spell books, some pranking stuff, those test runes we did, and… I think that's it. The second lock is the portable rooms, that we climb down into and have a couple rooms each. I have my Sega Genesis in there, and Neville's got his SNES."

"And," Remus interjects, "what are the restrictions on those rooms?"

"No one else allowed in here until next year, and don't even try it because you put wards up on em that'll let you know, and we'll get in big trouble," Neville says, pouting.

" _Third_ year, Neville," Remus says. When the boys give him a questioning look, Remus just turns and glares at his co-Marauder. "You didn't."

"To be fair, the wards won't go away until third year. I jus' told 'em until the end of this year so I could see how quick they nab a girlfriend."

"Uncle Paaaaddddfooootttttt," the two groan at him.

Both Marauders just give them a sly smirk, then notice the huge influx of people getting on the train.

"Okay boys, it seems like it's finally time for you to leave us," Sirius says, feigning extreme sadness. He then turns to Lupin, "We're finally free!"

They all start laughing and join in on a group hug.

Sirius interrupts the hug, and says, "Okay, make sure you Owl us when you get in with what houses you end up in and that everything's safe."

Harry just smirks at him. "You're just saying that because you and Uncle Moony and Nev's Uncle Algie have a betting pool on where we'll end up."

Sirius gapes at him, covers his mouth with both hands, and shakily gets out, "What.. What ever would make you think that?" He moves his hands, revealing a big grin. "It's the betting pool AND because we want to make sure you get in safely."

At this, the Marauders-in-training stick their tongues out at them. Trevor decides to join in and sticks out his tongue, while Hedwig just croons.

"I guess it's actually time for you boys to get going, don't want you stuck in a compartment with some bloody purebloods or Death Eater's children. Come now, off you go, off you go." Sirius just makes a shooing motion with his hands, pushing them away towards the Hogwarts Express.

"Love you Uncle Padfoot, Uncle Moony!" They shout as they board the train.

"Love you too boys! Now get yourselves both sorted into Gryffindor so your favorite Dogfather can rake in the galleons!"

* * *

 **And that's it for now! I was gonna make this chapter a decent bit longer, going all the way through to Hogwarts, but I've been enjoying writing the shorter and more frequent chapters. If you guys would prefer longer chapters and a longer wait, just tell me and I'll try to find some balance between it all.**

 **Next chapter: Hogwarts Express, Sorting, possibly a bit more. Definitely not the first day of classes though.**

 **I've been listening to nothing but the new RWBY soundtrack over and over again, since it dropped. I haven't decided my favorite song yet, it's between Bmblb, Boop Acoustic, and Like Morning Follows Night. It's no coincidence they're all the cutsey songs, I just enjoy them the most.**

 **What're your favorites?**


	4. Chapter 4: Entering Hogwarts

**A/N: WOOOOWWW it's been much too long since I posted a chapter. I knew I would get busier, but jeez this snuck up on me!**

 **I forgot to mention it in the last chapter, the trunks the boys have are shrinkable. I guess it's kinda easy to just assume that, seeing as they shook the trunks in front of Lupin's face, lol.**

 **I have most of the things for the crossover planned (and detailed thoroughly in a Google Doc), but the one thing I forgot about was any of our heroes to be a faunus. Since I'm sending four over into Remnant, I do want a decent amount of diversity in the cast instead of just four magicals all doing the same thing, and that might be a way to do it. So, I've decided to make a poll available on my profile to who, if anyone, to faunus-ify. Please check it out and vote!**

 **No matter how much one hopes, they can't magically gain the rights to Harry Potter and RWBY. *sigh* Oh well, guess it's better off in Jo and RT's hands anyway.**

 **xXx**

After finally saying goodbye to their honorary Uncles, the next-gen Marauders eagerly board the Hogwarts Express.

Harry turns to Neville and asks, "So Nev, what do you think? Free compartment and have perspective friends join us, or go around and try to make friends?"

Neville thinks about it for a second. "Well, if everybody here is gonna know that you're the _Boy-Who-Lived_ , and according to Uncle Padfoot they _will_ know you, then I'd say let people come to us. We don't want people just saying 'join us, join us' because they want to be in the same compartment as a celebrity, right?"

"Yeah, I guess," Harry responds. "But then what do we do about anyone who wants to join us? Do we just turn them away? Or do we let them in and have the same problem?"

Neville shrugged in response. "I guess we'll just handle that when we handle that."

Harry shrugged back. "I guess? Ooh, this one's free!"

The boys climb in. The compartment they enter seems just enough to hold four students, maybe six if they don't mind being cramped. They put their trunks and Hedwig's cage up in the space above the compartment, and sit down. It isn't too long until they hear their first knock on the door.

Harry opens the door, and is met by a blonde boy and two walking meat slabs. The blonde boy is giving off this cocky vibe, accompanied by a sneer that reads 'I'm clearly so much better than all of you'.

"Ah, Harry Potter, just the Boy-Who-Lived that I'm looking for. This is Crabbe," he says as he indicates the meat slab on his right, "and Goyle." He indicates the taller meat slab on his left. "I'm Malfoy. Draco Malfoy. My father has recently learned that you were unfortunately raised by the blood-traitor Black and the half-breed Lupin. He asked me to offer my assistance to you. Some families are simply better than others, you'll learn that quickly. You don't want to making friends with," Draco eyes down Neville, "The wrong sort. I can help you with that." He offers a hand, which Harry just stares at.

"Um, thanks, but I think Nev and I can figure that out for ourselves. I don't know what you're trying to say by blood-traitor and half-breed, but my uncles were great as raising me and my brother here."

Draco goes wide-eyed for a second, then turns his sneer back on. "You'll regret this, Potter. Drop the Longbottom, and accept the help of the Slytherin House. You'll be sure to go far."

"You heard Harry. We can handle making friends ourselves. Thanks, and buh-bye," Neville says, right before closing the door.

"Okay, our uncles told us to learn about the houses ourselves, so I guess we kinda know what to expect from Slytherin if any of them parade it around as much as he did. Gryffindor's where they both got sorted, so all that's a mystery is Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw. Seeing as our uncles were the ones to raise us, I'm pretty sure that we'll end up there, but it's still good to learn about the school as a whole, right?"

Neville nods at Harry's assessment, and adds, "Mhm, but all I really know right now is I'm not going wherever he's going if I can. We still don't know how we get sorted, do we?"

"Nope," Harry says, shaking his head and popping the 'p'. "I heard some people talking on the platform, and I heard everything from fighting a troll to having to find the common rooms ourselves in the huge castle."

"I really hope it isn't the second one," Neville worriedly replied, "What if we don't find a common room? Are we just left unsorted?" Neville exaggerates a shiver. "Hopefully we can just, like, pick one."

"Nah, that can't be it. They definitely mentioned sorted, so it's gotta be we do something, and that determines where we'll get placed. Maybe it's on the way to the castle? Like if we talk to no one we get placed in the anti-social house, or we make tons of friends and get placed in the family house. Or, or we be a huge prat to everyone we meet and get sent into Slytherin like Draco." It was Harry's turn to exaggerate a shiver. "Definitely gonna try to be the nicest I can be to everyone, if only to avoid being with _him_."

Neville snorts at him. "That's assuming you're right about sorting."

"Well, what, do you expect it to be the troll? It can-" As Harry's about to finish that sentence, the door opens.

"Oh, um, hi? I was wondering if I could join you guys in here? It seems like every other compartment is full," says the rude red-headed boy.

Neville and Harry share a look which they both recognize as, ' _What is he talking about? There's empty compartments!_ '

Neville is the one to break the silence. "Um, yeah sure, you can join… us." Just as he starts talking, the boy is already sitting down at Harry's side.

"Oh, wow, great! Thanks! My name's Ron. Er, Ron Weasley." Ron isn't projecting the same pompous vibe as Draco, but there's definitely something similar between the two.

"Um… Okay. Well, I'm Neville Longbottom and this is," Neville starts, only to find Ron interrupting him again.

"Harry Potter, of course! Man oh man am I glad I found your compartment! Two of the best Gryffindors-to-be, in the same place!" It suddenly became clear to both boys what was similar about the two compartment-crashers. They both just wanted 'in' with Harry.

Harry's smile turned a little into a speculative glare as he responds. "How do you know who's gonna end up where? Merlin's arse, I don't even know anything about any House but Slytherin, nevermind where I'll be!"

The redhead's jaw hit the floor. "The Boy-Who-Lived not being in Gryffindor? The house of the brave? The house of the warriors, the strong? The best house in all of Hogwarts?" Wide-eyed, he turns to Neville for some support. "Hey, you, um Nathaniel right? You know that Harry'll end up in Gryffindor, right? Back me up!"

"Er, um, Neville, I-"

"Listen here, Mister Weasley, I don't know what you think you know about Harry, but besides pranking he's rather quiet and awkward. And besides his helping people thing too. Sure I guess that's a little Gryffindorish, if the House is how you describe it to be, but I'm sure that when we find out about the other two houses it'll be pretty obvious that no one's a perfect fit for any house."

"Um, yeah. Unless they count pranking as the same as whatever that Malfoy kid was earlier," Ron looks utterly disgusted at just Harry's mention of that name, "I'll bet that I'll fit right into any of the other three houses. Still not like we know how we even _get sorted_."

"My brothers told me you have to fight a troll! I'm sure you'd do great at that, Harry!" Ron said, seemingly ignoring everything said before.

Neville finally had enough of Ron. "Okay Ron, I think that's enough."

"Eh?"

"You're like persuading Harry here into Gryffindor, almost like some kind of sales rep or one of those American Girl Scouts trying to sell us Gryffindor Mint Cookies. I think you ought as well leave. You know as well as I do that there's many empty or just not full compartments, so how about you just go to one of those?"

Ron looks to Harry with pleading eyes, but when met with a cold stare, he mumbles, "You'll regret this once you're sorted into Gryffindor for sure," and leaves.

The rest of the trip was calm, the two brothers in all but blood talking more about sorting and Hogwarts. Finally, the Hogwarts Express came to a stop, and they all headed out towards the boats, with an exceedingly large man narrating parts of their journey. They chose an empty one, and continued their conversation from before until they were interrupted by two girls.

"Um, do you mind if we join you?" The first girl asks. "We totally understand if you don't want to be bothered, being the Boy-Who-Lived and all. I'm sure you've had people trying to get up close and personal this entire trip."

Neville decided to give the two girls a chance, and responds, "Only two really bothered us. This blonde kid boasting about his father and Slytherin, and this redhead boasting about Gryffindor. As long as you're not here to try to get my brother to join your House or tell us who to be friends with, you can definitely stay."

The other girl responds. "The blonde Slytherin must be Malfoy, and the only redheads I know of are the Weasleys. Draco's father is on the Hogwarts Board of Governors, and Malfoy Jr. likes to boast about Malfoy Sr.'s power. 'Malfoys deserve better' or some crap, is what Auntie says that they say. The Weasley bothering you is interesting, I met some of the older Weasleys on occasion and they seemed like some decent blokes. Ooh, and their mother has some really nice cooking, she made food for a Ministry potluck once. Really weird that he'd bother you." She looks away and seems to take a breather after speaking for so long. "Oh! We never introduced ourselves, did we? I'm Susan Bones," she started.

"And I'm Hannah Abbot," the other girl finished.

"Well, as you already know, apparently, I'm Harry Potter, and this here's my brother in all but blood, Neville Longbottom," Harry responded.

They spent the rest of the boat ride talking. Susan's Aunt, whom the boys presumed to be her guardian since she never mentioned parents, was Amelia Bones, an ex-girlfriend of Sirius' and head of the DMLE. Hannah's family turned out to be a part of the 'sacred twenty-eight', the same thing that Neville and Sirius' families were in. The girls explained the remaining two houses to the boys, finally completing their knowledge. Finally, they all arrived at Hogwarts, and found themselves in the Great Hall. They kept talking, and half-listened to the witch who introduced herself as Professor McGonagall. They saw what appeared to be the staff table, with a bunch of professors behind it, and a throne of sorts, with a man in purple robes and a long, white beard sitting on it.

While all the students were getting settled, taking in the Great Hall, Professor McGonagall set up a stool, and placed an oddly shaped hat on top. Once the students noticed it, the entire hall fell silent. That was, until what appeared to be the mouth of the hat opened up, and it started to sing.

' _A magical hat, that sings no less? If this is our test I have no idea what we're in for. At least a troll, you just fight. This? What do I even make of this?_ ' Harry thought.

The only parts of the song that Harry noticed were " _I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat,_ " and " _try me on and I will tell you Where you ought to be._ " All they had to do was put on the hat!

Soon, Professor McGonagall started calling out people's names. Hannah and Susan were called out first, and both were sorted into Hufflepuff. Harry had already decided to try to make mental notes of where people were going, so he paid attention to everything. Terry Boot and Mandy Brocklehurst went to Ravenclaw, Lavender Brown to Gryffindor, Millicent Bulstrode and Vincent Crabbe to Slytherin, Justin Finch-Fletchley to Hufflepuff, Seamus Finnigan to Gryffindor, and Gregory Goyle to Slytherin. Then, the one thing that Harry never expected to happen, happened. He recognized someone being called up.

As Professor McGonagall called up "Granger, Hermione," Harry remembered the time Neville and he had snuck into the car with their uncles. ' _The bushy haired girl from the supermarket was a witch!?_ ' He made a special note that she got sorted into Ravenclaw. Lost in thought, he missed a few names until Neville was called.

A tense minute went by, until the hat shrieked "GRYFFINDOR!", and Harry's eyes followed Neville over to the table. ' _Maybe completely knocking off Gryffindor isn't too good of an idea. If it's good enough for my brother, it's gotta be good enough for me! Still definitely no Slytherin, though._ '

Morag MacDougal went off into Slytherin, and the reason Harry was never going to consider Slytherin's name was called. The hat barely even touched Draco's head before sorting him straight into the house he was blabbering on about back on the train.

And then, his name was called.

Everybody, sorted and not, started whispering. As he walked through the remaining crowd to reach the hat, he heard many whispers of disbelief and astonish of Harry being there. Of course, having been prepped by the Marauders about his fame, he was expecting it. Seeing it in action was a completely different story.

As soon as he put the hat on, he started to hear its voice in his head.

' _Hmm… Let's see. Decently intelligent, but not the most studious without some kind of real purpose. That definitely wasn't helped by being raised by Mr. Black, but there is something there solely from Mr. Lupin. Good men they were during their time here. They both instilled senses of bravery and goodness within you, and… oh ho what's this? Mr. Black has a wager going on if you place in Gryffindor? Interesting to note. Still, you do have a natural… How do I phrase it? Goodness within you? Determination to help others? Sense of family? If you say it as a sense of family, I think I might just know EXACTLY where to place you. But for the sake of getting this as right as possible, let's not. Not just yet. Ooh, very cunning, very ambitious. Very well suited for a certain palace of snakes. It seems I was right in delaying your placement, this is a much better house for you._ '

' _Not Slytherin, not Slytherin, not Slytherin!_ ' Harry chanted in response.

' _Oh? A strong desire not to be placed where you're sure to do well? And why would that be? Did Mr. Black instill his anti-Slytherin-ness into you? No… It seems a simple meeting of the Malfoy heir did this. Quite interesting… You don't want to be like him because you don't want to use others like he seems to, and you jumped to the conclusion that that's all Slytherin is good for because of how much he boasted about it. Ah… unfortunately you'd actually be right in your assumption. Nowadays, that's all Slytherins end up doing, with exceptions of course. If Salazar were still here, I'm sure he'd banish all that did this to his house to his Chamber underneath the school. If this were, say, fifty or sixty years ago, I wouldn't have cared one bit for your little distaste towards the house. Alas, you do have a point. But before I revisit my little sense of family comment from earlier, I do have a few pointers for you. The Slytherins may be referred to as snakes, but do not let that defer you from actual snakes. In fact, I'm sure you would get along with snakes quite well, if you chose to strike up a conversation with one. Oh ho ho… yes, you would indeed. Especially since the only other that could in recent times was, frankly, an utter bloody shite of a person._ '

Harry's immediate response to this was, ' _Talk to snakes?_ '

' _Did no one bother to tell you of your ability, young boy? Possibly out of fear of what that might lead you to learn about yourself, maybe. With all the 'urges' Dumbledore's giving even me, I think I could understand why no one that knows has mentioned it. I, however, am not so weak-willed as to let his beliefs delay you from important knowledge. How would you ever learn about your talent? Go to a zoo one day, and just start speaking to a snake within its cage?_ ' The hat starts to laugh. ' _While I'm parlaying information to you, why stop there? Let's see, what else can I actually tell you that actually matters?_ '

' _What you can tell me? Are you not able to tell me things?_ '

' _Well, of course I can, but I respect my creators too much to simply go about telling any student, say, the locations of my Lady Ravenclaw's diadem, my Lord Gryffindor's sword, or my Lord Slytherin's secret quarters. Not that I'm hinting you look into any of those things, that would be preposterous._ '

Those viewing this oddly extremely long sorting noticed the hat smirk.

' _Here's one bit of information I'm sure Dumblesnore will have kept from you; your soul isn't alone in this body._ '

Harry's eyes nearly bulged out of his head. ' _WHAT!_ '

' _I do not know exactly what, as it is incredibly dark magic, but it is definitely something you must be aware of. Now I would love to stay and chat, but… Actually no I wouldn't. I have students to sort, places to sit. Despite the obvious answer of 'Oh look! The Boy-Who-Lived, let's just throw him in_ GRYFFINDOR!' _Whoops, said that out loud._ JUST KIDDING, EVERYONE! MY APOLOGIES FOR THE SLIP UP! _No, no let's revisit that strong sense of family, and place you in_ HUFFLEPUFF!'

' _Wait, are you like a person or something?_ '

' _Asking if I'm self-aware? Trust me boy, that is one road you most certainly do NOT want to go down. Now get up, get me off, and go sit with your house-mates._ '

Harry took off the hat, opened his eyes, and saw all the shocked and confused looks that he had gotten.

The old man on the throne spoke up when he noticed that Harry was confused. "My boy, they're all just confused that they heard the hat say something aloud other than just the house the person under it was sorted to. I can assure you all, that besides the ten minute hat stall, nothing out of the ordinary happened here today."

"I was under the hat for ten minutes!? Harry nearly screeched.

"Do not worry, Harry," the old man said, with a twinkle in his eye and a soft smile on his face, "Nothing is wrong here at all." He then looked towards Harry's scar, and Harry could almost hear something that sounded like the man saying 'almost'.

With that, Harry joined everyone at the Hufflepuff table. He was so lost in thought, that after the obligatory hellos were over, he zoned out for nearly the rest of the feast.

That was, until he felt a sharp pain in his scar.

"AHH!" Harry all but shouted as he brought his clenched fist against the space between his eyes.

"You okay, Harry?" asked the boy who had introduced himself as Cedric Diggory.

Harry noticed the pain went away almost as quickly as it came, so shook his head.

"Alright then, don't be afraid to tell me, or any of your fellow Puffs, if anything is the matter, though," Cedric said with a smile.

"Thank you very much, Mr. Diggory," Harry responded.

Cedric gave a light laugh. "Please, call me Cedric. I'm sure I can speak for the rest of the house when I say that goes for any of us." This was met by a chorus of nods.

"Will do, Cedric," Harry said with a smile.

After that, he resumed his zoning out.

' _I'm not the only soul in my body? Who else, or what else is in here?_ '

 **xXx**

 **Whew! That was most certainly a long time coming! I was originally going to end the chapter after going to the common rooms, but realized I didn't know exactly how I wanted to go about having them, so I stopped here so this wouldn't be delayed any longer. (By 'having them', I mean if I wanted to go with girl's and boy's dormitories or a couple people to a room regardless of gender. I've read the latter in enough stories where I'd been convinced that was canon until I looked it up!)**

 **Also, the self-aware thing with the Sorting Hat was a reference to HP:MoR. If you don't know what that is, I encourage you to give it a read if you're comfortable with giving yourself a headache trying to read. LOL.**

 **Until next time! (Which should NOT be as long of a wait as this was.)**


	5. Chapter 5: Time Skips, Pt 1

**A/N: Jeez, life's been busy! I wish I could just blame it all on that, but I've actually been having a sort of writer's block for this chapter. At first, it was gonna be a regular chapter. Then, I realized that it's taking way too long to actually cross over. So, the wait is mostly over! The chapter after next will be the crossover! Yaay!**

 **To any people just seeing this, welcome to A Soul's Journey! My schedule is so irregular that it'll leave updates either grouped up or far between, but this story is** _ **not abandoned**_ **. Hopefully, you all don't mind too much.**

 **Don't forget to vote on the faunus poll on my bio!**

 **Enough rambling, and let's get on with the story! Of course, I own nothing at all in this story other than the order I put the words on the page. And even that's rather disputable.**

* * *

Harry arrived in the Hufflepuff dorms, still obsessing over what the Sorting Hat had told him. Not too much, though, as to miss really important things. Dorms by the kitchen, tickle the pear, knock to the tune of 'Hel-ga-Hu-ffle-puff' to get in, and dorms are separated by boys and girls, and then by years. He picked the four-poster bed in between Justin Finch-Fletchley and Ernie MacMillan, let his stuff down, and lay there awake. The other boys had talked for a little bit about… something, probably not important, and then each headed to bed. Harry was in his own world, but not too rude to respond with a 'good night' when he was given one. Finally, he was the last one awake in the Hufflepuff dorms.

' _Okay, so let's make a mental checklist. Sword of Gryffindor, Ravenclaw's Diadem, Slytherin's Chamber. Looking through_ Hogwarts: A History _, I found that the 'secret quarters' are called the Chamber of Secrets, and it's rumored you can't get in unless you're one of Salazar's snakes. The Sword of Gryffindor was a goblin-forged artifact that was wielded by Godric Gryffindor himself. No one knows where it is, but no one's really looking for it either. Rowena Ravenclaw's diadem has been lost to the ages and has been the subject of Hogwarts students' searches for a long time. There's also something about Hufflepuff's Cup in here, but it's pretty obvious why that wasn't even mentioned._ '

Harry thought back to a newspaper article he saw about a year or so back: "Founder's Artifact Found, but DESTROYED!" It was accompanied by a rotating picture of a large cup with a distinct crack through it. Harry was reminded of a picture he once saw of America's Liberty Bell, except the cup's crack was a lot more pronounced, and the edges of the crack had a black ooze looking thing all over it. The goblins found it within a vault that was broken into. Later scans revealed it was tainted with extremely Dark magic, and that was probably the reason it was in the condition it was found in. The Prophet speculated about what Dark magic someone possibly wanted to cast on the cup, but they came up empty. The goblins did a thorough search of the LeStranges' vault after this and found many more Dark artifacts that were immediately confiscated. Had the three of them not already been in Azkaban, these objects were apparently evidence enough to have them thrown in immediately. The Minister didn't want them to be Kissed, however, so he just moved them to a more secure section of the prison.

Harry also decided that he would actively search out a snake or something to try out his Parselmouth ability on.

It was then that Harry decided to tackle the elephant in the room. Or rather, the elephant in his body. He wasn't the only soul here! Wild thoughts of a demonic possession and an exorcism and everything went through his head, and all the thinking promptly knocked him out. Not after he'd been lying there for about 2 hours, but it did the trick nonetheless. He did make a mental note to look up some demons, no matter how insane the thought was.

* * *

Neville was not a happy young Gryffindor. He was separated from his brother, stuck in a bed next to Ronald "I'll snore so loud that your eardrums will burst" Weasley, and alone in Gryffindor without a single friend yet. Dean and Seamus didn't seem too bad, but they'd gone off to sleep before they could really get to know one another. He was not going to entertain the thought of befriending the red-headed weasel, between his actions on the train and this incessant snoring. Luckily, it seemed that the feelings were mutual.

Worst of all, Harry wasn't picking up his mirror. What was the point of a super convenient, long-range form of communication, when Harry just left it in his trunk all the time!?

He decided to try to hit the hay quick, so he'd see Harry as soon as possible tomorrow morning.

* * *

It was an interesting experience for one young Ravenclaw that night. It seemed that, even in the house of the intelligent, the house of the knowledge-seekers, the house of the studious, she was **still** too much of a bookworm to have anyone like her. One girl had been a little rude, Joe Chang or something, but besides that, it seemed that everyone just tended to avoid her. It seemed poor Hermione Granger just couldn't catch a break here. Mostly, that was.

She thought back to the name, Harry Potter. She had obviously read about him in books, the Boy-Who-Lived and savior of the Wizarding World. But something else stuck out at her. A memory, perhaps, that she just couldn't quite place? He just seemed so familiar, even though everyone and everything had said he'd basically just fell off the face of the Earth after He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named's demise. But she was sure that she'd seen him before! She wouldn't be a good Ravenclaw if she didn't pursue the answer, so she decided that she would try talking to him during their first class together.

This would be the last time she was ever excited for a Potions class with Professor Snape.

oOo

Harry entered his first class at Hogwarts more than just a little nervous. Of course, Harry had been warned about Snape from his uncles and was not about into in to their old rival's class unprepared. He had studied up on some potions and ingredients before the class just in case the greasy dungeon bat did decide to quiz him like they assumed.

When he entered, he realized every 'Puff already had a partner, but not every 'Claw. He looked for a while until he saw, sitting alone, the girl he recognized the name of during the Sorting. Hermione. Since everyone needed a partner in Potions, and there wasn't anyone left in his house to sit with, he took the seat next to her.

"Hi! I'm Harry! Harry Po-" he started, only to be interrupted by Snape's _AHEM_.

Without saying any form of greeting, the bat started to call roll. When he got to Harry's name, he made a rather disgusted sneer and called him 'our newest celebrity'. Whatever that was supposed to mean. He proceeded to drone on with some spiel about potions and whatever. Harry knew it didn't matter much, from what he was told about Snape. In fact, from what he was told, that quiz should be happening right about...

Now.

"Potter!" Snape blurted out, like the name itself was diseased or disgusting. "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

' _Powdered root of… wormwood, that's… AHA!_ ' "Sir," Harry said, "that is part of the process to produce Draught of the Living Death."

Snape's scowl turned into a calculating stare. "Alright, Potter. What would you do if I asked you to locate for me a bezoar?"

Harry snickered in response. "Well, firstly I'd say just go check your storages. Any Potions Master worth his salt would have an anti-poison readily accessible, wouldn't he?"

And the sneer was back. "You didn't truly answer the question."

"Fine, I'd get one from a potions store. No way I'm digging in the stomach of a goat unless it was the last bezoar on Earth."

Snape was clearly growing frustrated. "What's the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

"There isn't one, it's the same plant, aconite."

"What does Amortentia smell like?"

"Trick question, the scent varies from person to person."

"How long does Felix Felicis take to brew?"

"Six months."

"Who invented the most popular hair growth potion?"

"Bet you wanted me to say Sleakeasy, eh? Since that's the name of it? Nope, that'd be my grandfather, Fleamont Potter's doing. You must be really grasping at straws if you're trying to catch me off-guard with that."

The silence in the room after that comment was palpable. Snape was nearly shaking with anger, using up seemingly all his self-control to not be doing so. Finally, the anger burst out.

"TEN POINTS FROM HUFFLEPUFF FOR EACH COMMENT MADE! IF YOUR POTION TODAY IN CLASS IS NOT FLAWLESS, TEN MORE POINTS FROM HUFFLEPUFF FOR EACH STEP!"

It seems, despite his body language staying mostly stagnant, his voice and eyes betrayed his true anger.

Hermione, after raising her hand for the first few questions, stood back in some kind of mix of awe, anger, and fear. Awe of Harry's ability to stand up to a teacher, anger at Harry for disrespecting a teacher, and fear of being Harry's partner for the potion that could cost his house so many extra points. She wanted to win Ravenclaw as many points as possible, obviously, but she wasn't about to go as far as sabotaging a potion on a classmate. Especially not when she really wanted to get to know said classmate.

Snape pointed to the instructions on the board, swept his finger across the room, and fled the room for his storages behind his desk, cloak billowing behind him. A lot of chatter started when it was clear he wasn't coming back.

"How could you talk back to a Professor!?"

"Maybe he really WAS supposed to be in Gryffindor, like the hat said the first time!"

"Duuuuuuuuude!"

"ALL THOSE POINTS!"

"I believe in you Harry, you can get that potion right!"

"Yeah sure, perfect potion on his first try? If I had more practice with Arithmancy I'd get you the actual odds, but instead, how about I just add up all the points you're gonna lose when he DOES get it wrong?"

That last comment really hit the Hufflepuffs in the room, and they all started defending Harry. That was until the ruckus seemed to bring Snape out of his room. He pointed his wand at every cauldron, and Harry was easily able to deduce what Snape had done.

Every student started turning their heads about and moving their mouths, but no noise came out. At least, not to Harry, as he quickly noticed each person talking to their partner. ' _Small, localized, silencing wards. Hmm, definitely an interesting choice. Guess he's gotta let the partners speak to each other, or he'd sabotage the whole class. Doubt even he could get away with that._ '

Finally, Hermione decided to speak up. "So, um, hi?"

Harry looked at her, a little shocked. "Oh, um yeah. Hi. As I was saying, I'm, well, Harry Potter. But I guess you could just call me 'in an ass ton of trouble' since that's more accurate."

Hermione shot him a very displeased look. "Harry, language."

"Oh, um, sorry Hermione," Harry said, looking down and shuffling his feet a bit.

He looked up and met Hermione's quizzical stare. "How did you know my name? I never got the chance to introduce myself."

Harry could easily feel he blush coming on. "Oh, um, well, I just remembered it. From, uh…" ' _Think, Potter, how do I say 'Oh yeah I remembered you all the way from like 4 years ago in a supermarket' without sounding totally creepy?'_

"From the Sorting?" Hermione supplied.

Harry's face lit up at the chance to escape that bit of awkwardness. "Yeah, um, that's it! From the Sorting! Totally!"

Hermione let out a suppressed giggle. "Well, I definitely see why you weren't placed in Slytherin. It doesn't take a Ravenclaw to figure out you're hiding something, Mister Potter. So out with it."

Harry let out a breath he didn't know he was holding and covered his face in his hands. "Okay, it's gonna sound kiiiiinda creepy, but I remember you from when Nev and I ran you over in a Muggle grocery store when we were like 7." He peered out of the space in between fingers to check if she was creeped out by this, and found a little smile.

"I honestly can't believe you remember that! I only did since that scar of yours if pretty unique, and described in so many textbooks. Did you know just how many books were written about you? It's quite marvelous, really."

"I'm well aware of how many books I'm in," Harry said with a frown. "In fact, last I heard about it, my dogfather was looking into getting some of those taken down. 'Infringing on personal matters' or something. Not sure. He was gonna talk to a cousin-in-law about it, Ted Tonks I think."

Hermione looked shocked at this. "You don't want to be in _books_!? Wait wait wait, more importantly, _dogfather_?"

Harry stammered a bit before answering. "Oh, well you see, my godfather, who's also my uncle, is a big dog animagus. Well, actually, he's a Grim animagus. But don't tell that to too many people, since animagus forms of mythical beasts are like super rare."

Hermione gave him a look, seemingly pleased with the fact that she was getting exclusive information. Such a Ravenclaw.

"Anyway, me and Nev call him our dogfather. Partly since calling him 'Uncle' gets repetitive, just 'Padfoot' gets us yelled at, and 'godfather' isn't true for the both of us. Technically, neither is Uncle, but that won't stop me and Nev from calling him and Uncle Moony that. So, we settled on bouncing between 'dogfather' and 'Uncle Padfoot'. You're staring at me like I've got three heads. What's wrong?"

"You're preparing the potion all by yourself! And while talking!" Hermione looked star-struck.

"Well, yeah! I don't wanna let my fellow 'Puffs down by letting the potion be bad, but I also don't wanna stop talking to you. So," he gestured with his hands, one of which still holding a knife, "why not both!"

Hermione blushed a little at the 'don't wanna stop talking to you', and jumped onto potion-making duty. "Well, we ARE supposed to be partners doing this, so at least let me help. I memorized making this potion a while back. Hiccupping Potion, off page 76 of _Magical Drafts and Potions_."

Harry just stood there, mid-chop, blinking and staring at her. "You memorized even the page number of the potion!?"

Hermione's blush deepened a little. "Well, um kinda. I kinda memorized all of the potions in the book and all of the page numbers." She then looked at him a little sad. "Oh no, you probably hate me now since I'm such a nerd."

Harry's only response to that was to stand there, mouth agape for a few seconds. Then, he burst out into laughter. At Hermione's inquisitive glare, he explained himself. "What, being a bibliophile's a crime? You have your thing, and it's kinda cute." Once he realized he just called her cute, both their faces turned into bright red tomatoes. "Well, I um mean, that, it was um, er I just, it's your own, erk, um quirk?"

…

Awkward silence.

…

They both burst out laughing at the same time. At least, it seemed, that they both knew to take things pretty lightly. They took the rest of the class getting to know each other better, the conversation hidden under the silencing ward Snape had erected. Finally, they finished the potion, and talked a little more. Harry learned a bit about her, like her parents being dentists (although he didn't exactly know what one of those WAS), she's muggleborn, and just how insane the girl was about books. She could talk seemingly forever about books.

After a bit of that, Snape came out, looking calmer but no less stern than before, and gave the entire class something between a glare and a sneer. Silently, he collected the students' potions, and let the entire class free of the wards. Each and every student was much too afraid of him at this point to dare speak, even with the ability to do so restored. He dismissed the class after ensuring every bottle of potion was labeled with the students' names. Before leaving, however, Harry made sure he did one thing.

"What is it that you are doing, Potter?" Snape demanded.

"Just making sure nothing ends up changed with my potion." He retrieved a sample of the leftovers from the cauldron and put it into a bottle. "This, this is to make sure you don't just make a change to my potion unfairly and fail me for no reason. It was Uncle Moony's suggestion. He also suggested a few spells," which Harry took the liberty of performing, "to prove that it's mine. All this is, is insurance. I'll take whatever grade I deserve, but only if I deserve it. Especially since my new friend and I both made the potion together. Don't want her failing for your grudge against my dad."

Snape gave a pointed look at that last comment.

"Oh yeah, my uncles warned me about your grudge. All it means for me, is I'm not gonna take any crap from you if I can avoid it. But, I'm also not gonna start anything with you. You are still my Professor after all, I can't just be going about, acting all high and mighty. This is your classroom, I respect that. I just want you to respect me. And with what I was warned about, I think I need this little bit of insurance to make sure that happens. I have a meal to run to, and I'm sure you're quite tired of my face and voice. Toodeloo!" With that, Harry departed for the Great Hall, leaving a shocked Severus in his wake.

* * *

 **This chapter got a bit out of hand. This is actually only half of what I expected to be writing, but that Snape scene just wrote itself before I knew what was happening. That does have the positive side effect of making it so about half of the next chapter is already written, though! Unfortunately, it does leave these chapters seeming like filler. To me, they're important to developing characters (the rather AU Harry in particular). Especially with what I have in store for the future of our heroes!**

 **Until next time!**


	6. Chapter 6: Time Skips, Pt 2

**A/N: Let's skip this chapter's 'oh no life got in the way of writing' segment. I got writer's block on the very last part of the chapter (which is the actual reason the chapter was delayed), so please excuse how bad it is.**

 **This still came out longer than I wanted, and could've again split this chapter into two, but then I'd probably find something else to put in there and blah blah blah. No more stalling!**

 **Don't forget, there's a faunus poll on my bio and I own nothing.**

* * *

Harry was one of the last of the 'Puffs to reach the Quidditch Pitch, due to an overly long conversation with Neville at lunch. He arrived to see a bunch of Ravenclaws walking away from Hermione with weird looks on their faces. She didn't seem to happy about the engagement, so Harry decided to walk over to her.

"Hey, Hermione, wh-"

"Well, what are you all waiting for?" a woman yelled, interrupting Harry. "Everyone stand by a broom!"

Hermione, still looking a little flushed from her encounter, took the broom closest to her, and Harry the one next to it. Over the course of the 'Up!'s and light flying around, Harry kept trying to ask Hermione about what happened, but was getting no results. She moved away from him at some point during flying, so he accepted it and just decided to practice a bit. When Madam Hooch (that was apparently who interrupted him earlier) called him down to correct some of his movements and positioning, he noticed Hermione around those same Ravenclaws. Once he was released, he moved over towards them.

"Heh, stupid little Mudblood thinks she's good enough to be a Ravenclaw? Can't be a Ravenclaw without your books now can you?" This 'Claw then looked over, saw Madam Hooch distracted, and flew away with the bag. Harry surmised that she planned on dropping it off at the Astronomy Tower, and return before Madam Hooch saw them. It would've worked too, had Harry not noticed. However, instead of doing the sensible thing and asking Madam Hooch for assistance, he flew right towards the escaping bully.

He chased the 'Claw down, slowly gaining on her, until she noticed him. She turned around, looked at Harry with a most disgusting expression, and smirked. He noticed her eyes shoot downwards before turning around, so he looked there too. He quickly realized her plan when he saw the cliff edge and start of the Black Lake closely nearby. She edged closer towards it, so he went to intercept where the throw would be. His assumption was proved correct when she tossed the bag right where he expected. He leaned into a dive, catching up to the bag. This had the unfortunate outcome of also plunging him straight towards the cliff edge.

Once he had a strap of her bag securely in his hand, he pulled up and away with extreme grace. By the time he was back up, he quickly noticed the presence of the bully. Or rather, the lack thereof. The next most obvious thing was all the eyes staring at him, especially those of Madam Hooch and Professor McGonagall. What ever she was doing at the pitch for the 'Puff and 'Claw class was beyond him, but it could not be any kind of good news for Harry. He flew back towards the pitch, more than a bit hesitantly, and dropped the bag off to Hermione.

"MISTER POTTER! FOLLOW ME TO MY OFFICE RIGHT NOW!" Professor McGonagall shrieked.

* * *

As it turned out, Harry wasn't in as much trouble as he expected. Both Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff lost points for that, Ravenclaw for bullying (though McGonagall and Harry both could not figure out exactly who was responsible), and Hufflepuff for being irresponsible and not letting the adults handle the situation. Harry had been expecting detention, or a big smack, but never in a million years did he expect the outcome to be his being placed on the Hufflepuff Quidditch team, a secondary Seeker to Cedric Diggory.

Harry had asked McGonagall why it wasn't Professor Sprout that was telling him all this. She had simply frowned and muttered something like "not appreciate Quidditch". Harry went to the next Quidditch practice, and spent nearly the entire time talking to and learning from Cedric.

Directly from Cedric, he learned that his father, Amos Diggory, worked for the Ministry, in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. He had no real passion for flying until Hufflepuff had required a seeker in order to compete in the Quidditch cup the year prior.

From observations of other people, Harry figured that he was really well-respected. Surprisingly enough, that respect seemed to go between Houses (to a degree, most of Slytherin wouldn't be remotely open to a non-Pureblood). A real Hufflepuff's Hufflepuff he seemed to be, helping people out with pretty much anything. It would be easy to mistake him for a prefect, had he not been so clearly a Third Year.

Cedric and Neville got along rather well too, not as much as Harry had with the older boy, but well enough. ' _It could only be a good thing if your friends were all friends, right?_ '

That thought actually got Harry wondering if he should introduce Hermione to them both. Ravenclaw never had any classes with Gryffindor, so Neville never got to meet her. For the longest time, Harry had been too focused on spending time with his pseudo-brother to remember her. ' _Which sounds really terrible thinking about it,_ ' and led to his subsequent decision to unite all his friends.

Luckily, the other boys were accepting of Hermione's… quirks. Begrudgingly so, but accepting nonetheless. Surprisingly enough, Neville seemed to adapt to her faster than Cedric. All seemed well so far, even with that weird 'troll in the dungeons' incident earlier that week.

oOo

One day, while Harry and Neville were in the midst of planning a prank, they ended up walking behind Professor Quirrell. As Harry looked at his turban, once again a pain seemed to eminate from his scar.

- _I feel the boy's pressence, Quirinuss. He iss a mere few pacess behind you. Make sure you losse him before you head to the third floor. We do not need anyone knowing about the Sstone._ -

- _Yess of coursse, my Lord._

Many things seemed wrong about what Harry just heard. For one, the words did not seem at all like proper English. The 'S's and 'C's came out almost like a hiss. The entire conversation just felt… off, like there was something sinister about just the words spoken. Not to mention the meaning behind those words! And the big one, the fact that Quirrell was having a conversation seemingly to himself! It couldn't have been a Muggle telephone, since his hands were clearly not up to his ear, but it was definitely two distinct voices he heard.

And sure enough, when they got to the way to the third floor, Quirrell headed off in another direction, one Harry, through watching the Marauder's Map, knew led in a circle back to the third floor's stairs.

"Nev, did you hear Quirrell back there!?" Harry asked, once said man was well out of hearing range.

"Hear… Quirrell?" came Neville's shocked reply. "He didn't say anything. The only noise was some weird sound, like a pipe leaking or something. I've heard it a few times this year already, and I'm sure you must've too, so it must just be something wrong with the pipes. Unimportant though. Definitely no conversation."

' _No conversation? Pipes leaking? No, I definitely heard-"_

The Sorting Hat's words came back to him in a rush. ' _In fact, I'm sure you would get along with snakes quite well, if you chose to strike up a conversation with one. Oh ho ho… yes, you would indeed.'_

"PARSELTONGUE!"

"Parsel.. What?" asked Neville, with an extremely confused look on his face.

Harry exhaled deeply and started to explain. "Parseltongue, it's this thing where people can talk to snakes. I'll explain more about it to you and the others later, I should've brought it up a long time ago. Anyway, the reason it sounded like pipes leaking to you is because you aren't a Parselmouth. That leaking sound? No pipes, it was hissing. HISSING. Quirrell was hissing to something… A pet snake then? I guess the first voice was his then, since there's no way a person would be calling a snake his Lord, right? And…"

"Harry, Harry, please stop with the Hermione impression." Harry shook a little on this, blinked a bit, and frowned a bit, forcing a stifled giggle out of Neville. "Maybe you could wait a bit, gather the thoughts rambling about your brain there, and tell all of us at once what you think's going on? Cuz I really wanna know about this 'Parselwhatsits', and don't wanna hear," Neville straightened his back out a bit, put his fingers over his eyes in circles to imitate glasses, and with a terrible impression of Harry, continued, "Parselthingandsnakesandpipesandhissandhissandhiss." Harry's eyes grew wide in shock, and Neville couldn't stifle the laugh this time.

Returning his hands and posture to normal, he added with a smirk, "Sorry, mate, but that's really how you sounded."

"Prat," was Harry's response, followed by him socking Neville on the arm. "Fine, let's just get this hair color changing potion over the the House Elves and gather the troops. I wanna get to the bottom of this and you're _clearly_ going to be no help."

Neville shot a glare over at Harry for that last bit, but continued on the way to the kitchens anyway.

oOo

"Okay," started Hermione, "so what do we know so far?"

"Number one," answered Cedric, "this entire thing's insane, and I cannot believe any non-Gryffindor would seriously consider this at all."

"Hey!"

Both Harry and Hermione were hard-pressed to keep their laughters from escaping, but it was Harry who recovered from it enough to speak first. "Ced, you've been saying that for the past two weeks, but you keep helping us out anyway."

"Yeah, only to make sure you don't get yourselves killed!" shot Cedric.

"Pfft, yeah right, if you didn't want us to get killed you wouldn't have helped us figure out the dog needed music to be put to sleep," was Neville's reply. "I'm sure we'd be at least a few days behind without knowing that already, even with Hermione here."

The girl in question gave him a pout, and mumbled, "at the most, one day behind," earning smirks from the other three.

"Fine! Yeah, I'm as curious as the rest of you! The only reason I even knew that was 'cause my dad told me about one time where a stray Cerberus pup -by the way it's not a _dog_ , it's a _Cerberus_ \- ended up in his office," said Cedric. "Anyway, I guess that's the real number one."

"Alright, number two. What's number two?"

Harry gave a childish laugh at Neville, and started, "Number two is-"

"Harry James Potter don't you finish that sentence!" Hermione said, swatting at Harry's ear.

Grabbing his stinging ear, Harry groaned. "Fine, _ouch_ , the real number two is that Quirrell is either insane or hiding a snake or something under his turban, but he's after some Stone, and it's hidden under the Cerberus."

"And number three," finished Neville, is that Dumbledore's out of the castle today, and this is the perfect opportunity to go and check it out. So off to the third floor corridor we go!"

* * *

Down in the dungeons, just a little earlier that day, a certain Dark Lord and his host came to the same conclusion.

- _Quirinuss,_ \- hissed the deformed face of Voldemort, - _that fool'ss out of the casstle today. You musst know what thiss meanss?_ -

- _Yess of coursse, Masster._ \- replied the normally stuttering DADA Professor. - _Tonight, we take the Sstone, and begin your magnificent return to life!_ -

* * *

Cerberus? Put to sleep easily.

Devil's Snare? Neville recognised it, unfortunately just too late, and got hurt pretty bad before they could burn it.

Flying key? Harry and Cedric both got on a broom, with Harry gloating only slightly when he got the correct key first.

Wizarding Chess? Between Cedric playing with his father growing up and Harry playing with Neville and Remus, almost no challenge, the only problem being Cedric getting taken out right at the end, rendering him unable to continue.

The troll? Already dead upon their arrival, to which Hermione let out a breath she didn't know she was holding, so they moved on to the next room with no problems.

The potions puzzle? This one actually did cause the remaining two some trouble. Not because they (read: Hermione), couldn't figure the puzzle out, but because they couldn't choose who to go through the flames. After a lot of arguing, Hermione finally allowed Harry to move on past the black flames, and she took the other potion and went to aid Cedric and Neville.

Harry, now filled with determination, continued on. He knew something was amiss since the troll was dead, but couldn't quite put his finger on it. It had to be a recent death, since it reeked so horribly, which meant that someone else might be beyond the black flames. That in and of itself didn't make much sense, though, since someone must have had to pass the black flames. The potion Harry took was enough for just himself, and there was none missing. The only thing that made sense was Neville's hysteric belief that Professor Snape was also down here, since he would know how to beat his own puzzle. And if Professor Snape was down here, that would mean…

oOo _Flashback_ oOo

" _Harry, Neville, there is one more thing you need to know about Snivellus," Sirius said._

" _Sirius," Remus scolded, "at least call him Snape. We can't have the boys waltzing into Hogwarts calling professors by mocking nicknames, now can we?"_

 _Sirius groaned loudly. "Fiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnneeeeeeeeee. Snape," which he said in a mocking tone simplyto spite Remus, "was a Death Eater."_

 _Both boys simply just sat there, something between shocked and confused._

" _But Uncle Siri," Harry asked, now just confused, "I thought you said that he was crazy for my mom. Wasn't my mom a mugglebotn? Why would he go and follow the guy who wanted nothing more than to make all witches and wizards like my mom go away?"_

" _Well," Remus sighed, "it was a multitude of things. For one, after… a certain incident, Lily was no longer on speaking terms with him. Then she started dating your father in seventh year. The biggest two were shared by most of his followers. Fear, and peer pressure. I canjust imagine it now. 'C'mon, Severus! All the cool Slytherins are doing it! Take the Mark! Take the Mark!'"_

 _At the boys' uncomfortable looks, Sirius tried to do what he was best at, lightening the mood. "Not that any of this matters, since Ol' Voldey is long gone, and any Death Eaters bad enough have been caught. Plus, Dumbledore trusts him, so he can't be that loyal to the codger!"_

oOo _End Flashback_ oOo

With everything that had happened so far in the year, with Snape's evil presence and tendendies to lurk around this corridor, not to mention his jinxing of Harry's broom during the one Quidditch match he played this year, (Cedric had decided to let Harry take the match against the Gryffindors to 'give him a shot at playing', but everyone on both teams knew it was to take care of Cho Chang in the Hospital Wing) it wouldn't make Neville's theory that insane. If Professor Snape was down here, and Professor Quirrell was down here, and the latter had some kind of crazy snake related secret, that must mean that they were loyal to Voldemort!

Harry took the potion, passed through the flames, and found his theorys crushed. There, past the flames, lay a defeated Professor Snape, bleeding out on the floor, and a ripped turban. Looking further into the room, he was finally able to determine for certain what, or more accurately, who, the s-s-stuttering p-professor was hissing to.

"Voldemort?!"

* * *

"You… you killed a professor?!"

Harry pinched the bridge of his nose with his non-broken hand. "Yes, Hermione, but I don't really think that's the most important thing that happened down there."

"Yeah, yeah, you got the Stone and probably saved a whole bunch of people. And since you're fine," Harry's eyes went wide at that, pointedly looking at all of his injuries and his broken hand, "I don't have to worry about that, so I can focus on what really matters. What's going to happen to the exams! What about the class!"

"Typical Ravenclaw," came a new voice coming from the entrance to the Hospital Wing, "only caring about school. I once had a 'Claw blow off a date in a broom closet because she felt compelled to write another like, meter of parchment for Transfiguration."

Harry and Neville, who fell asleep at Hermione's first lecture once Harry woke up, both shot up at hearing the voice. "UNCLE SIRIUS!"

Neville shot up to hug his adopted uncle, and Harry would have followed suit if not for Madam Pomfrey's poignant warning of 'if you leave that bed I will make sure you don't wake up until you're healed'.

"I'm just here to make sure you're getting along all right, pup." The look in Sirius' eyes suddenly got less jovial. "And to tell you to be ready for the summer. Both of you. Your friend, Amos' son, explained to me the general details of what happened, and is telling Remus the more detailed stuff now. We're gonna make sure you're prepared for next year. It seems Voldey is back, and something tells me he's not just gonna forgive you for the whole 'ruining his rein of terror' thing anytime soon."

oOo

When Sirius said the boys would be prepared, he truly meant it.

The first thing they did was get started on teaching the boys how to become Animagi. Since this process took the most time, they decided to get that out of the way first. Once they got to the point where the two just had to meditate daily, they started on other subjects.

They taught them both how to enchant objects. They were nowhere close to doing something like enchanting a broom, but they did create their own two-way mirrors, which they owled to Cedric and Hermione. They got started on runes, and learned the entire third year's curriculum in about a month. With that, they successfully runed their trunks to be damage resistant and inflammable. Potions was a necessary one, since Neville was pretty much unable to learn anything from Snape at all. They got pretty good at identifying potions ingredients in the wild, and making necessary potions like a blood-replenishing potion.

During the last month, Harry and Neville split off with Sirius and Remus, respectively. They decided to compound on the boys' basic skills and make them able to excel in one more area each.

Sirius took Harry out flying, so he would be able to escape a bad situation would it arise. He also had Harry rune his broom with an extender, allowing it to hold up to three more people at once. Neville worked with Remus on a Medi-Wizard crash course, since Neville was so good with plants. Plants, as it turned out, worked very well with healing magics to make wonderful things. Slings that healed a broken arm more than ten times as fast, flowers that, when ingested, made the blood-replenishing potion flow through the body more easily, and so much more. Some of the time, the plants didn't even need to be magical. The stem of a sunflower used as a straw for Skele-Gro diminished the potion's horrible tase (not nullified; it still tasted pretty bad) and made the bones grow back marginally stronger.

By no means did this training make them as skilled as Cedric, being two years younger than him, or as much of a genius as Hemione, but it certainly gave them a huge leg up on the rest of their year and the year above. Due to them learning things mostly off of the Hogwarts curriculum, they had a huge advantage in their overall skillset.

They left the boys with two very interesting gifts each. Neville's first was a modified Devil's Snare from the States that could wrap wround his left wrist. While completely outlawed in the States, there was nothing about it in any laws in the British Ministry of Magic. The bracelet didn't do too much, it could help grab on to things, act as a sort of third hand, or become a pair of handcuffs, but was still affected by the Devil's Snare's typical weaknesses. His second gift was the more interesting one. A flask, with the engraving LPp3 on it, found in Grimmauld Place. Once a potion is placed inside, it would last much longer than a typical amount of that potion would.

Remus had explained to them exactly what it did. "Let's say you put in enough Polyjuice Potion for one dose. Once you've taken that dose, you'll notice the flask is still nearly full. We haven't done the exact math on this, but it appears to be about three to four times more than what you put in to it. We removed every seemingly Dark enchantment from it, but the only one that we couldn't figure out how to remove was one that didn't allow it to be filled with water. Curious little addition that one is."

Harry's gifts were a little more tame. He was given a magical set of glasses that let him see through Invisibility Cloaks and other disguises, and the Marauder's Map was upgraded a bit.

"You can still tell it 'I solemnly swear I'm up to no good', and it'll default to Hogwarts," Sirius told him. "But let's say you sleep in the Leaky Cauldron for a week, you can say 'I solemnly swear I'm up to no good in the Leaky Cauldron', and it will show you a map of there. It'll only show a map and footprints after a week, and it'll take closer to two month to show names with those footprints."

oOo

Finally, the end of the summer had arrived.

"On a scale of Peter Pettigrew to Bellatrix LeStrange," Sirius had said, "I think you'd be able to handle a solid Rookwood or Malfoy." This, obviously, completely confused the boys.

"What Sirius is trying to say," Remus clarified, "is that you're both very powerful for twelve year old boys. And while I do agree with him about being able to handle Malfoy, please don't go looking for any fights. We don't need to get an owl hearing you've gotten into any trouble like that."

"Other kinds of trouble, maybe," said Sirius with a smirk. "But he's got a point, no _looking_ for fights. Getting into them is a different story after all…"

"And that's where this conversation is ending. You two really don't need any more ideas. I heard about one of your pranks on the Ravenclaws already, and if you can come up with changing their hair into feathers all on your own…"

Sirius' smirk turned into a full out grin. "Then you don't need anything we could come up with to make yourselves any better!"

oOo

"For a Hufflepuff, this is extremely Gryffindor of you, Harry!" The two younger boys rolled their eyes, while Cedric gave a light nod.

"C'mon Hermione!" whined Harry.

"Yeah, Purrmione!" chimed Neville. "If there's really-"

SMACK!

"Neville Frank Longbottom!" screamed a furious Hermione. "What did I say about reminding me about that stupid Polyjuice incident!"

"As fun as it is to watch you two fight," started Harry.

"No, it's really not," corrected Cedric.

"Maybe for you, Ced," countered Harry. "Anyway, We got stuff to do! If Ginny's actually down there, we gotta go get her!"

"Erm, Harry?" Cedric asked, with an appraising look on his face. "Not that I'm saying trying to help her is bad or anything, but since when did you care about any of the Weasleys?"

Harry considered this for a second. Just before he was about to answer, though...

"It's his little saving people thing, interrupted Neville. "At this point, we all know he has one." At Harry's indignant look, he went on. "You even tried to help the snakes with the aftermath of our last prank! Don't believe me? Fine then, it must just be your thing for redheads."

Blushing at that, Harry snapped, "I do not have a thing for redheads and we do not have time for this!"

And with that, the young group jumped down, cushioning charms at the ready. Unfortunately for them, cushioning charms would not be able to help with what was about to happen.

* * *

 **LPp3 stands for Locket Protection Prototype 3. It's my idea for a leftover of Voldemort's locket protection. Sure, the Dark Lord was a genius, but even geniuses need prototypes, right? And LP** _ **conveniently**_ **works for both Locket Protection and Longbottom Potter!**

 **Crossover next chapter. Things are gonna get interesting, so hopefully my writer's block won't get in the way of that coming out before the end of January. Stay tuned for Chapter 7!**

 **Ninja Edit 1:36 am EST 1/3/18: Fixed horizontal lines and other formatting issues.**


	7. Chapter 7: The Chamber of Sins

**A/N: OKAY! Didn't do too bad on the time between chapters this time!**

 **I'd like to thank all of you who voted on the faunus poll. I closed the poll rather shorty after Chapter 6 going live, though didn't hide it once it was closed. I decided that the suspense enough would be in discovering which of our winners would go through. By the way, 'currently unrevealed surprise character' was Hermione. Big shock, I know.**

 **A weird issue I had writing this chapter was my keyboard dropping inputs, so words ended up like 'keybdputs' instead of 'keyboard dropping inputs'. It was mildly annoying, but infrequent enough to not stall the chapter much!**

 **Now onto some news. The next chapter I post isn't likely to be one of A Soul's Journey. I had an idea for what I find to be a really interesting fic. It might take a little bit of explaining for it to make sense, but if you're interested in a Harry Potter fic (non-crossover), I'd love it if I can get some feedback for it once its up!**

 **This intro has gone on long enough, so remember that I own nothing and enjoy!**

* * *

The group landed on the dank floor of the Chamber of Secrets with a springy thud. With a simple ' _Finite Incantatem_ ', the roosters Cedric had transfigured returned to their natural forms, from the wood blocks they had been for the last few days.

"I know I said I trusted you with the whole chickens thing, Ced," Neville shouted, surprised,"but I'm surprised that it actually worked! They're totally fine!"

"Neville, be quiet!" Hermione reprimanded, quietly, "if we want to have the best chance of coming out of here alive, then we'd best not ruin any chance of an element of surprise. Also, they are roosters, the difference truy matters here."

"Chicken, rooster, what could it matt- AAHH!" Neville's retort was cut off by the discovery of the shed basilisk skin. Large, thick, and spread throughout the rest of the chamber until the door, it was no wonder why the boy was left speechless.

"That," Hermione gulped, "is what it could matter." Still blinking furiously and quite nervous, she continued. "Unless you want to get killed by the thing that made that, you'd best be sure you have a rooster. It's call is lethal to the beast, afterall."

Neville, sweating a bit, responded, "um, yeah. So, um, rooster. Got it."

Finally regaining some composure, Hermione scolded, "And what did I say about being quiet!?"

Their argument was interrupted by the sound of hissing, coming from Harry. He and Cedric either completely missed the shedded skin, or chose to ignore it, as they had reached the door to the main lair of the chamber. The two lacking behind quickly caught up to the others, as the door finally, and slowly, opened.

Light began pouring out of the crack, clearly not enough to be sunlight, but enough to be artificial in comparison to the few lit sconces on the walls behind them. Once the door opened more, the group could finally see what was causing them. Balls of the _Lumos_ spell were floating about, at what appeared to be intervals of a shape. Lo and behold, it was most definitely a shape; a circle was etched about two inches deep into the floor, with smaller circles protruding from the main one underneath the balls of light. There appeared to be other things as a part of the circle, but the young wizards and witch could not make heads or tails of it.

"If those are runes, they're above anything we saw in our textbooks over the summer," said Harry.

"Yep, and above anything we've been taught in Runes so far," was Cedric's reply.

"Well, you both carry everything around in your pouches, right?" Hermione excitedly responded, more than a little awe-struck by the work done on the chamber floor. "We could maybe jot them down on paper after we get Ginny out of here, and try to identify them later!"

"I don't really think that's important Hermione, I mean we're just down here to-" Neville's attempt at stopping Hermione in her tracks was stopped in its _own_ tracks, by the loud hissing of the basilisk.

Instantly, everything heated up. Harry and Neville's training kicked in, and Hermione readied her rooster. As soon as she went to make it crow, an unknown voice called out a spell none of them recognized. Instantly, the basilisk and rooster were silenced, and the real fight began. Cedric transfigured the roosters into mirrors, and they used those to look, with extreme caution, at where the basilisk was, and aimed spells at various parts of its body. Due to the basilisk's thick, magic resistant hide, not even their most powerful _Bombarda Maxima_ could make it even shift slightly.

Finally, the basilisk decided to stop playing with its food, and lunged for Harry. Neville tackled the basilisk, hoping to make it move enough to not bite Harry. Unfortunately, one of its fangs slid across Harry's wand arm as it was pushed by Neville's attack. As the creature was about to turn its attention to Neville, the faint sound of a trilling bird song distracted it, as well as all of the young magicals.

Fawkes, who Harry and Neville had been told about by their uncles, came rushing in. In his beak was the Sorting Hat, and in its claws, a large sword with ruby-colored gems on the base of its golden hilt and the extremes of its guard. If Hermione were not distracted by this entire sequence of events, she'd certainly recognize it as the Sword of Gryffindor. It dropped the Hat to Harry's feet, and the Sword into Neville's hands. Fawkes flew to Harry's arm, and only then did Neville realize that he was hurt. Recognizing the potency of the venom from the creature, he became filled with rage. Stabbing the sword directly into the center of its skull, Neville avenged his fatally injured brother. He then turned to Harry, only to be shocked at the sight. Fawkes, perched on the lightning bolt-scarred boy, began to cry onto the wound.

Hermione, choked up with tears and emotion, managed to get out only a few words. "Phoenix tears…" Immediately, Neville's healer training came back to him.

"Phoenix tears top the list of the most powerful healing agents," Neville recited, "easily doing things that would either take incredible time, or be flat out impossible for basic healing potions to do. It is impossible for them to be bottled, because they last virtually no time outside of the crying phoenix's eyes."

"Impressive, young Longbottom, for you to know all that," came some voice from the back of the chamber. "And it is quite a shame that Fawkes did show up, as nothing else would have saved poor little Harry from my pet's venom."

All of them, Fawkes and the Sorting Hat included, turn to the location of that voice. There they see a young man, maybe only as old as the seventh years, holding…

"Ginny…" whispered Harry.

The young man dropped the ginger-haired girl's corpse, along with a black book, onto the floor outside of the circle.

"Yes, Miss Ginny Weasley. She was quite the asset in my resurrection, and the overall planning of the events here today. She was quite enamored with you, Harry, so she knew exactly how to make sure you'd come to her rescue if need be. And, oh, trust me, it was needed. If you had been maybe just a bit faster, or I a tad slower, you could have been the hero today. But, no. That could never be. No one, especially no puny. Little. **Boy**. Could ever manage to defeat the grandiose Lord Voldemort. You did not on that Halloween night, and you most certainly did not here. Eliminating one blood traitor for my resurrection, and another two and a filthy mudblood right after surely marks a good day."

"You… you're Lord Voldemort!?" shouted the overwhelmed Harry.

"No, but also yes." Voldemort then conjures some floating letters spelling out Tom Marvolo Riddle, and rearranges them to be Lord Voldemort. "Currently, I am still mostly just Tom Riddle, sixth year prefect. Soon enough, all of my memories and power will be restored to me. And what better way to do so than a banishing ritual? The power one obtains from an advanced ritual like this is just too good. The only reason I never did one of these is because of the most peculiar ingredient required. And you just so happened to provide it for me."

Voldemort then summoned the corpse of the basilisk to the middle of the circle, the _ritual_ circle, and immediately the whole thing flared to life.

"I would say more to you, maybe get to know the one prophesied to defeat me, but this is where we say goodbye. I have things to do, followers to punish, and so little time to do it. So long!"

Then everything went black.

xXx

All four woke up at about the same time. Speechless and still terrified, they simply took in their surroundings. A silent 'point me' spell told them where north was.

They appeared to have been transported to the middle of a forest. A copy of the ritual circle lay burnt into the grass, completely the same as the one from the chamber minus the size. All around them, except to the northeast, the group could see nothing but trees. Thick trees as far as the eye could see. Towards the northeast, however, they could see a small clearing past a large boulder.

Harry was the first one to find his voice, and meekly said, "what…"

A branch snapped to the east, and they all turned that way, wands at the ready. Suddenly, Hermione was pinned down by a giant, mysterious monster. The wolf-like creature's left paw lay directly on top of Hermione's now completely destroyed wand. The boys, enraged, fired off a multitude of spells at it. While giant, it seemed devoid of any magical resistance. Only a few spells were able to not just get it off Hermione, but kill it entirely.

As soon as they recovered from that first attack, two more of the beasts appeared. Attacking from the south and southeast, these two were no harder to take down than the previous one was, minus the surprise factor.

"What in the world are these things? Where are we!?" Harry shouted, at no one in particular.

An answer came, but not in words. It came in the form of the boulder behind them being shattered by a larger one of the beasts. Another look at it, though, revealed that it wasn't just larger, it had more of the spike looking things and a more terrifying face.

The creature started charging at the four, who quickly dispersed. Propelling themselves away from it when it got close with mild _Bombarda_ , they were rather safe from it, for now. They knew that they would run out of magical energy to expend eventually, but had no other options as the wolf-like beast seemed to be as resilient as the basilisk.

Just before their magical energy reserves emptied fully, a miracle happened. It was too fast and practiced for any of the group to comprehend, but their troubles were over with in what seemed to be a single swipe.

With all that finally over with, the youngest three fell to the ground in their exhaustion.

"Umm…" came the gravely voice of the man who saved them. "Are they alright?"

Cedric, with an exasperated look, just stared at the mystery man.

"I'll…" the man sounded very confused, "take that as a no."

Cedric, turning around to grab something out of Harry's moleskin pouch, only quietly said "yep."

Once he pulled 4 invigoration potions out of the seemingly tiny bag, the raven-haired man's eyes grew wide. The real kicker for him, though, was when the kids sprung back to life immediately after ingesting a sip.

"Alright, what exactly is going on here?" The man demanded. "First, you all fight an Alpha Beowulf with skills that shouldn't be possible, and with less strategy than a fly has going into a spider's web. Then you drink some red liquids and you're all okay? I'm going to need some answers here, and fast."

All four kids, nervous and scared, flashed their eyes between each other hoping someone else would do the talking. Finally, Neville, ever the Gryffindor, spoke up.

"Um, sir, my name's Neville, and," he then indicated each other member of the quartet, "this is Hermione, Cedric, and Harry. We're… I don't know if I should be telling you this, but I have a feeling it doesn't matter like it would if we were home. We're wizards. Well, Hermione's a witch, but… Um, yeah. Magic's real?" He then sported an apologetic grin, and tensed up a bit.

"By the way you're talking, I'm almost sure she isn't a Maiden… yet you have actual magic? It would explain all those explosions without any sort of actual weapon." He took a pause and a deep breath, and continued. "I'll have you know I'm not too quick to trust people. What you guys are saying doesn't exactly make sense, you know? But, you're kids. I have a camp set up nearby, which is how I even heard all the noise you were making in the first place. You can follow me, and have a place to stay for a bit, but I am going to need you to explain. Everything."

* * *

 **AAAND there's the crossover! The chapter was originally gonna be longer, but there was such a nice cutting off point there that I had to end it. Plus, it means that I don't have to try to cram everything into this chapter, so it'll be better overall.**

 **There's been one point of the story that I've been very undecided about, and it's the glaring age gap between the starting age for Beacon and Hogwarts. I had two ideas originally, either have the HP characters in Remnant for enough time for them to be old enough, or just have them use magic to make themselves appear old enough. If anyone has any suggestions, please leave them for me!**


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